Ryan Armstrong earned second place for his project titled “Quantifying the Evolution of Gas from Li-ion Battery Materials” under the mentorship of Gabriel Veith of Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Along with a $750 scholarship and trophy, Ryan will travel to Los Angeles, California, in May to compete at the International Science and Engineering Fair. (Submitted photo)

Seven research students from Oak Ridge High School competed in the 66th Annual Southern Appalachian Science and Engineering Fair hosted at the University of Tennessee. The competition was held March 27-30 with the awards ceremony on Thursday evening. There were 55 Senior Division projects in competition, a press release said.

Five of the students were part of the Math, Science, and Computer Science Thesis course at ORHS that is advised by Tammy Carneim and Jessica Williams. The remaining two did their research independently with the help of teachers Deni Sobek and Sharon Thomas.

Ryan Armstrong earned second place for his project titled “Quantifying the Evolution of Gas from Li-ion Battery Materials” under the mentorship of Gabriel Veith of Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Along with a $750 scholarship and trophy, Armstrong will travel to Los Angeles, California, in May to compete at the International Science and Engineering Fair.

Jasleen Narula earned fourth place and $100 for her project titled “Rapid High-Throughput Toxicity Screening of East Tennessee Water Samples Using Autobioluminescent Yeast Assay” under the mentorship of Steven Ripp. [Read more…]

Top row from left above are Kate Hausladen, Michael Ma, and Rachel Barton Pine; and bottom row from left are Sidney Matlock and Hannah Shipstad. (Submitted photos)

Four East Tennessee students have been selected to participate in a special master class with celebrated concert violinist Rachel Barton Pine on Friday.

The master class is from 3-5 p.m. Friday, March 31, at the Oak Ridge High School Performing Arts Center. It’s part of a series of concerts and outreach activities featuring Pine and presented by the Oak Ridge Civic Music Association.

Kate Hausladen is a 15-year-old sophomore at Oak Ridge High School. She began playing violin at the age of four, studying with Oak Ridge Symphony Orchestra violist Susan Shor, and has been studying with Karen Kartal for the past six years. She has been a member of the Knoxville Symphony Youth Orchestra Association since 2010, and she has played in the Youth Orchestra for the past two years. She has been chosen to play in the Youth Aliyah annual concert in Oak Ridge several times and was selected to the All East and All State orchestras in 2016.

Hausladen is also a competitive soccer player and was All State for the 300-meter hurdles in 2016.

She will perform “Rondo,” the last movement in “Symphonie Espagnole” by Edouard Lalo.

Several Oak Ridge teams advanced to the state chess team championship this month after a regional tournament in Lenoir City on March 4.

Two teams from Oak Ridge High School qualified, and so did teams from Jefferson Middle School, Woodland Elementary School, and Linden Elementary School, a press release said.

The Tennessee Chess Association regionals held at Lenoir City High School on Saturday, March 4, included 151 students on 32 teams from 18 schools across East Tennessee, the press release said. In each of the four grade divisions, the top four teams qualified to play in the state team championship at Tennessee Tech University in Cookeville on March 25.

The K-9 division was won by the ORHS freshman team of Logan Ogle (captain), Justin Blanchard, Edward (“Bear”) Moran, and Minwoo Kim, the press release said. They were tied for first with top-rated Episcopal School of Knoxville at the end of the last round, necessitating a blitz (10 minute) match to determine the winner. This match was tied 2-2 so a second match followed, which ORHS won. This matched the result of the 2016 ORHS freshman team, which also won the team regionals in a playoff. [Read more…]

National Merit Semi-finalists—Sitting: Abigail Greenhalgh, daughter of Dyrk and Heidi Greenhalgh; Lara Blokland, daughter of Willem and Suzanne Blokland. Standing: Logan Rumbaugh, son of David and Rebecca Bowman (Submitted photo)

Here are photos of National Merit Semi-finalists and Commended Scholars at Oak Ridge High School.

Semi-finalists scored in the top 1 percent in the state, while the Commended Scholars scored in the top 2-3 percent in their state on the PSAT test in their junior year. The PSAT is the National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test. [Read more…]